Saturday, November 18, 2017

New Delhi: Chaotic scenes at the Delhi airport are soon going to be a thing of the past, the Bureau of Immigration has told the Home Ministry. Wait times have already cut down to 10 minutes from 22 minutes earlier it said.

In an hour-long meeting, the Union Home Secretary Rajiv Gauba reviewed plans which are being implemented to end inconvenience to passengers seeking immigration clearance at the Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi.

"We had done some capacity additions at the airport the review was about that," Mr Gauba told NDTV. Earlier this month, NDTV had highlighted the chaos at the airport and how it was mismanaged. The Home Ministry had reacted to the report and increasing handling capacity at various levels.

The bureau conveyed in the meeting that 10 more immigration counters have become operational at the departure area since November 15. This was done after the Delhi International Airport Limited (DIAL) provided additional space. Additional manpower and equipment such as passport reading machines, computers, and web cameras have also been provided to make the functioning of these counters smooth.

With the operationalisation of 10 additional counters, the number of such booths has gone up to 85, both at arrival and departure halls, including those for e-visa.

"The deployment of additional personnel will augment manpower strength at immigration counters to enable the staff to provide professional and courteous service to travellers", a senior official said.

There has been a 30 per cent increase in international passengers at the IGI airport in the last two years, with serpentine queues at immigration desks.
18/11/17 Neeta Sharma/NDTV